Crisis in Congress shakes Colombia

Some politicians arrested, linked to death squads

November 22, 2006|By Juan Forero The Washington Post

BOGOTA, Colombia — The government of President Alvaro Uribe is being shaken by its most serious political crisis yet, as details emerge about members of Congress who collaborated with right-wing death squads to spread terror and exert political control across Colombia's Caribbean coast.

Two senators, Alvaro Garcma and Jairo Merlano, are in custody, as is a congressman, Eric Morris, and a former congresswoman, Muriel Benito. Four local officials have been arrested, and a warrant has been issued for a former governor, Salvador Arana. All are from the state of Sucre, where the attorney general's office has been exhuming bodies from mass graves -- victims of a paramilitary campaign to erode civilian support for Marxist rebels in Colombia's long conflict.

The investigation, which has revealed how legislators and paramilitary commanders rigged elections and planned assassinations, has shaken Colombia's Congress to its core. One powerful senator from Cesar state, Alvaro Araujo, has warned that if he is targeted in the investigation, it would taint relatives of his in the government and, ultimately, the president, whom he has strongly supported.

The arrests and disclosures about the investigation, which is focusing on at least five more members of Congress, come weeks after prosecutors leaked a report revealing how paramilitary fighters have killed hundreds of people, trafficked cocaine to the United States and sacked government institutions while negotiating a disarmament with Uribe's government.

Mario Iguaran, the attorney general, said the crisis is worse than the scandal that tarnished former president Ernesto Samper, who in the 1990s was accused of having used drug money to fund his political campaign.

Uribe's government says it has been tough on the paramilitary forces, noting that 30,000 fighters have demobilized in three years, a disarmament larger than that of any leftist rebel group in Latin American history.